Ligue 2 betting preview : Brest -Le Havre
Brest-Le Havre
We have a lot of notes on Le Havre this season and I have been quite pleased with those, I latched onto their big potential in October and spoke not only about that, but also their very good team spirit, work ethic ( see notes on Fabien Farnolle below) and how they had played pretty much as well as anybody in Ligue 2 over the last five-six months, in my preview of their home game with Valenciennes last month .....
Since the last win, former US head coach Bob Bradley (pictured) has taken charge of the club, this has been in the offering for a while, with US businessman Vincent Volpe buying a major shareholding in the club over the summer. Timing was a little odd, given the upturn in results, but the players knew this was coming, Bradley has had two weeks at the club and he will be desperate to win on his home debut.
Quite a bit of disruption, but they look back on track, are playing on Friday and since October they have collect two points more than leaders Dijon and 16 more than Niort. Now the bad news, they will be without striker Mathieu Duhamel this evening, but they have won the last two starts he has missed, including one where they were down to ten men for over 75 minutes and fellow front men Gimbert, Mousset and Mendes have 16 goals between them. The visitors have a VERY experienced midfield , with Bonnet, Fontaine and Thomas Ayasse and the addition of the latter in the transfer window looks good business, he was a key player in Troyes title winning team last season and he can help HAC at the very least close in on the top two in the coming weeks.
Aside from a mini blip around the turn of January you can make a case for them having played as well as anyone one, maybe better, since October and that is half a season, I spoke about the huge team spirit in the squad after the first Valenciennes meeting, a game I analysed closely, including pre and post match .............
For once, these two did what was expected and HAC ran out the 1-0 winner, courtesy of an early and very well taken Mathieu Duhamel goal, he should have had another with a one on one and HAC almost paid for that when Valenciennes were awarded a dubious looking penalty, but this was saved by giant keeper Fabien Farnolle and justice was done. It was a game of very few real chances, but I have to admit to being rather impressed with HAC, I saw video of them in warm up and they were really going for it, much more than you normally see ( I always try to get into Griffin Park early to see how the opposition prepare, it is incredible btw how many teams come out for the second half and do no last minute warm up at all, the Bees always do at least 90 seconds or so, but I digress) , keeper Farnolle must have saved 100 shots and was drenched in sweat going back to the changing rooms, they came out fired up, looked sharp and got that early breakthrough goal. Every key moment was celebrated as a group, which I always like , they were really pumped by the win and there were extended and jubilant celebrations after the game shown on the club website. You can learn quite a bit from titbits like these and this is clearly a very together group of players, you cannot fake joy and comradeship and we know they have ability.
They get Mathieu Duhamel back today (he scored the winner in the reverse fixture and has a goal in 2 of 3 starts after an absence) and have their full array of attacking options, defensive midfielder Cédric Cambon is suspended, but they have no other major problems.
Valenciennes have added a little more experience to their squad, but still have five teenagers in the group and remain a little short of options on the left flank, they look to have enough about them to survive, but have failed to score in 8 of 12 away starts and look up against it here. Time for Le Havre to cut loose a little and they could really do with the confidence boost a commanding home victory would bring.
They won that and 3/4 games since writing ( all at home), but there is not much wrong with their road form (only two teams have won more away from home) and their 2-0 win over Laval last week took them into the top three and a promotion spot and now, with six games left to play, their destiny in in their own hands and despite the difficult of this fixture , given that Brest do not concede many goals or lose at home too often, the timing of this fixture might favour HAC, Brest have taken just one point from two games and that has seen them fall just a little too far off promotion pace and they are not going to pick up 7+ points on (all) four teams, with only 18 up for grabs. Also, despite that 8-4-3 record on home soil, it is possible to pick some holes in their form against the stronger teams, the eight wins have come against teams with an average league position of 14th ( none in top 6) and the seven games in which they have dropped points came against sides with an average placing of 6.85 . HAC have named a strong and offensive looking squad and I make them a very solid bet.
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